Polymeric materials, especially thermoplastics, have several potential advantages over glass for use in electronic devices, such as substrates in flat panel displays. Generally, plastics are lighter and more mechanically robust than glass. Additionally, plastic processing, especially of continuous films or sheets, allows low-cost production of parts.
Plastics can be made nonplanar by molding or embossing. However, the dimensional constraints for display and other electronic applications exceed standard mold making technology. For example, display panels must be optically flat, and many of the desirable features are only several microns in size. It would be desirable to have a process for making optical quality mold inserts with precision microfeatures for the production of molded polymeric articles having precision microfeatures.